Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Do You Have to be a Little Crazy to Preach the Gospel?

In our readings Mark (Mark 3:20-35) reveals that Jesus
is precisely what the religious authorities don't expect. They have no idea
what to make of him. He doesn't meet their expectations, and what doesn't fit
our expectations we typically label abnormal, or deviant, or crazy, or
possessed. They are “outsiders.” We assume that what we know and have
experienced becomes the standard by which we measure – and judge – the thoughts
and actions of others.

Religion was established to
regulate our relationship with God. The root of the word itself comes from the
Latin ligare, to bind, which supplies the roots of the words
"ligament" (tissue that binds together) and "obligation"
(the duties to which one is bound). Religion, then, most often serves to
connect us again to God by specifying what actions, duties, and obligations we
should undertake out of reverence to God. On one level there's something
absolutely right about this. Religion offers us a way to structure our thinking
about God and relationship with God. It gives us forms by which to express our
grateful response to all of God's activity. The trouble arises, however, when
we allow our religion to become a substitute for a genuine, living relationship
with God. We do this when we use religion not just to offer structures that
facilitate our relationship, but actually to manage and control that
relationship or, worse, to manage and control God.

This is why Jesus sets
himself against all the powers that would rob humanity and creation of the
abundant life God intends – whether those powers be unclean spirits; disease
that ravages the mind, body or spirit; illness that isolates and separates
those who suffer from community; or whatever. Jesus introduces a new vision of God
and a new way to relate to God...and it's not what any of those…make that any
of us – religious folk would expect. (David Lose,
Marbury E. Anderson Biblical Preaching Chair,Luther Seminary St. Paul, MN)